05.29.25

Cultural infusions in signature drinks

I have many flavors and ingredients that, when spotted on a menu, are instant purchases for me. Papaya, starfruit, and passionfruit, to name a few. Mixed with nostalgia and rarity, I just adore tropical fruits and East Asian flavors. Black sesame, to me, used to be a rare flavor that I could occasionally experience in a crisp form or as a paste inside tang yuans. Lately, I’ve had it in ice cream, mochi donuts, and cheesecake. Normally, it’s found in food items but when I tasted it in a cappuccino? It became my longstanding favorite hot drink at Breadbelly, a perfect mix of the black sesame flavor and lightly sweetened (my cold favorite is the yuzu Americano).

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08.09.24

A change in my business direction: Adding more photography services

It’s been a heck of a long time since I’ve updated this blog and to be honest, I don’t know who reads this anymore. I do know that some of my older blog posts have been surfacing in Google results and I’m not sure why. So, if you’ve landed on this site because of a Google search and you’re looking for a professional photographer, then perhaps this blog post will explain things to you.

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05.26.23

11 years of freelancing: Things I’m still working on

Today, I celebrate 11 years of freelancing.

It feels like just yesterday when I wrote about a decade of doing this. In wedding anniversary materials, I should be gifting myself with something made of steel (blah blah about being married to my work). In the past, I’ve done posts that list the things I’ve learned, but I’m switching it up this time to 11 things I’m working on.

Thinking back to my early days of freelancing, I remember comparing myself to others further in their careers. I thought they knew everything and were so put together. So I’m here to combat that belief: I don’t know everything and I’m still kind of messy.

Here are 11 things I’m still working on (lots of reframing work happening here):

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02.22.23

my writing process

My writing workflow is probably more elaborate than it should be. I’m a slow writer. At least, I believe I am. I would never survive in a newsroom. It takes me what feels like forever to gather interviews, and that part alone isn’t a single task.

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02.15.23

There is always a budget even if they don’t tell you so

In my experience as a consultant and freelancer—trying out different ways of handling new client inquiries—asking for the budget is one of the ways to weed out those who aren’t serious yet about hiring you. I make the intake question required, though people have filled it out before without actually putting in a number. I don’t ask for an exact amount; a range is fine. What I really want to know is whether you put a little thought into what a project might cost you.

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11.17.22

Remembering Twitter

A eulogy, of sorts.

At the end of 2008, I was finishing my first semester as a college senior. When I started undergrad, I’d already had a Xanga, LiveJournal, Tumblr, and a barely touched MySpace. Facebook had just opened signups to non-college emails. The online world fascinated me and here came along this network that you could micro-blog on!

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08.24.22

I’m a lurker, you’re a lurker, we’re all lurkers

It is said that 90% of any online social readership are lurkers. Lurkers are those who consume the content but don’t respond to it. Nine percent are contributors and only one percent create content, forming the 90-9-1 rule. This is not a new marketing rule and it seems to apply only in spaces for online communities, such as Twitter, Reddit, interest-based forums, Twitch, etc.

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